ORLANDO, Fla. – Facing its second straight strong opponent, No. 28 IUP women's tennis dropped its second match of the season with a 6-3 defeat at the hands of Texas A&M-Kingsville on Tuesday.
 
The Crimson Hawks are now 5-2 overall on the season, while Kingsville improved to 6-3. The Javalinas are the seventh-ranked team in the South Central Region.
 
IUP takes 2-1 lead after doubles play
Rachel Wood (Nottingham, U.K./West Bridgrord) and Raquel Gonzalez (San Sebastian, Spain/Colegio Sagrado Corazon) opened up the morning with an 8-3 victory at No. 2. After an 8-4 victory by Kingsville at No. 3, Jarka Petercakova (Bratislava, Slovakia/Sport Gymnasium) and Luise von Agris (Castrop-Rauxel, Germany/Adalbet-Stifter-Gymnasium) picked up a key 8-5 victory at the No. 1 spot over Valerie Ruiz and Victoria Romanovskaia.
 
Kingsville mounts singles rally
The Javalinas won three straight to open singles play to take a 4-2 overall lead in the match. Katya Minchenkova (Mytishchi, Russia/Secondary School No.12) stopped the Kingsville run with a 6-3, 7-5 win over Vivian Ortiz at No. 5
 
Kingsville then wrapped up the match with their top two players, Valerie Ruiz (12th in South Central) and Lisa Carvajal (17th), earning wins at the No. 3 and No. 1 spots.
 
Up next
The Crimson Hawks will face their first ranked Division II opponent of the year on Thursday as they battled 34th-ranked North Georgia.
 
Follow
For up-to-date game information, visit www.IUPAthletics.com and follow IUP women's tennis on Twitter @IUPCrimsonHawk and @IUPtennis.